"Pursue, keep up with, circle round and round your life, as dog does his master's chaise. Do what you love. Know your own bone, gnaw at it, bring it, unearth it, and gnaw it still." --Henry David Thoreau

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Tuesday, June 14, 2005

Join the Club?

Today, I did some last minute shopping at the Touchstone art gallery where I bought the bridesmaid gift for my sixth (yes, sixth) wedding. You should check it out, great stuff.

I am returning home for the second time in three weeks tomorrow (a six year record), and I am once again saying good-bye to one of my best friends who is getting married. Obviously, she is still going to be a dear friend, but I have noticed a change in all my friends once they take the marital plunge. It feels like all of a sudden, they aren't in my club anymore. They've got a new club, a better one, one that makes their mom and dad really happy and shows they are emotionally mature and have life all figured out.

Moreover, there is this division as I grow older that is basically divided between the young people who go out, go crazy and rely on friendships versus the coupled people who maybe I see once every month or so and just like me because I tell stories about tequila body shots off my roommate's tits and the like while they talk enthusiastically about cool blenders and measuring for carpet.

I am, of course, happy my friends are happy, but it is hard to connect sometimes when people's lives seem so different. Not to mention there is this large finality about marriage. There it is with the "I do," life is sort of laid out there for you go along with as you are inextricably tied to this other person to which you have fully committed your life. It's just startling and strange to me (which I guess is why I am not married).

One of my dear friends is having some serious relationship problems. And one of the best feelings I can think of having in a long time is when she called me yesterday to talk about her problems and seek my advice and support. This friend and I haven't really been keeping up due to her serious relationship being so involved. Now that it is on the rocks, she is calling me twice a day and e-mailing to discuss every little thing. It's great to be back in her life again (despite the sad circumstances), and I am struck at how much our relationship can change just because she is more alone now and needs a friend. It is only those people in my club that make me feel like our friendship has any real value aside from just chatting and keeping up.

So all I can really do is hope that there is a time in my life when I am ready for that long walk down the aisle when leaving the club to make that kind of commitment will make perfect sense. It seems that is the course of life, and I am just waiting to wake up and be ready for it.

Great post and dead on. However, if you think marriage changes your friends, wait until they start chunking out the kids. When my wife and I had kids we went from out every weekend to out every six months. And then you gotta develop the new friends: the parents of your children's friends...a task fraught with many false steps.

As a girl who is now attached and in a relationship and on the marriage track so to speak, I find myself thinking similar thoughts as you. I got out of the whole nightlife scene long before I met my guy and found myself having a lack of things in common with my girls who were still doing "body shots off of their roommate's tits" (so to speak, of course).

I find that I have learned who my real friends are when we can both get passed the teqila shot talk and cool blender/carpet color talk and get to the conversations that do matter: like how our relationships (boyfriend, family, AND friends) are actually going, how are careers are going, are either of us in need of any advice or support, etc.

I find that it's a matter of growth and being supportive of each other's decisions (whether it be a single lifestyle or a marriage lifestyle).

Some of the "friends" that I had when I was still in my partying hey-day have fallen by the wayside because our conversations can't seem to ever get passed the partying/appliance talk. I think that sometimes the key element to a friendship can be a lifestyle (such as being in college and living in a dorm together or partying together) and when one person moves on to another phase in their life the friendship, as a result of the lifestyle change, ends. It's the friends that stick around through each others inevitable lifestyle changes that really matter and should be valued. Just my two cents worth!

Six times a bridesmaid!! That may just be a record, my dear. Now -- I have an idea for you. How about posting pics of those six bridesmaid dresses and having the readers vote about how dreadful they are?

Also, as a six time bridesmaid, you can surely appreciate this funny web site:http://www.uglydress.com/

"Moreover, there is this division as I grow older that is basically divided between the young people who go out, go crazy and rely on friendships versus the coupled people who maybe I see once every month or so and just like me because I tell stories about tequila body shots off my roommate's tits and the like while they talk enthusiastically about cool blenders and measuring for carpet."

Ha ha ha... this is so hilarious... and sadly, so true... It's amazing to see how quickly people drop out of groups because of relationships.... unfortunately, I've done it myself once before. But I have since then taken a vow to never do it again -and to always remain crazy and fun with similar tequila shot stories ;) (with or with out a bf)

On behalf of the entire Urban Family, I feel your pain. I'm tired of my smug married friends being condescending towards me and my single lifestyle.

And seriously, what's up with this new "tradition" that says its acceptable to invite people to weddings in far off and mystical places (like the Midwest) without permitting them to bring a date along?

Just because were single DOES NOT mean we're second class citizens. But you know, I always get them back in the end. . . The Party Girl with no date = Drunk Party Girl doing shots at the bar.